Showing posts with label Taliban. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Taliban. Show all posts

Sunday, October 13, 2013

Tweets of Note: Recent Political, Public Policy & Pop Culture tweets you may've missed -October 1 thru October 12, 2013 -From Amnesty to Angie Harmon, Jack Bauer to Jack Wilshere, Fraser Nelson to Mickey Kaus and illegal immigration

Congressman boasts immig amnesty will win because "there is no money on the other side" http://t.co/BlXaS9EyeO #wheresCommonCausewhenUneedit













































































"Jack Wilshere should stick to his guns over Englishness of Manchester United teenager Adnan Januzaj
Jack Wilshere is wrong to make U-turn over Manchester United prospect Adnan Januzaj's eligibility for England – not least because he has a point."

























































I wrote about Chaz's blog post on Monday in my blog post titled, "Chaz Stevens' latest blog post is a reality gut-check for the State of Florida re their lax enforcement of rules and laws re municipal CRAs, including where he lives in the Grand Duchy of Deerfield Beach, where bureaucratic self-enrichment is a tradition, not a rumor
"
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/10/chaz-stevens-latest-blog-post-is.html



















James Romenesko @romenesko: Chaz Ebert: "Dear Roger, It has been six months since you left us, but...

































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Sunday, March 4, 2012

A week later, this essay still resonates: Andrew C. McCarthy in NRO: Why Apologize to Afghanistan?


A week later, after reading many other articles about what's been going on in Afghanistan that either just beat around the bush or which -surprise- made excuses for President Obama, this essay still resonates for a reason:

National Review Online         
Why Apologize to Afghanistan?
By Andrew C. McCarthy
February 25, 2012 4:00 A.M.

We have officially lost our minds.
The New York Times reports that President Obama has sent a formal letter of apology to Afghanistan’s ingrate president, Hamid Karzai, for the burning of Korans at a U.S. military base. The only upside of the apology is that it appears (based on the Times account) to be couched as coming personally from our blindly Islamophilic president — “I wish to express my deep regret for the reported incident. . . . I extend to you and the Afghani people my sincere apologies.” It is not couched as an apology from the American people, whose frame of mind will be outrage, not contrition, as the facts become more widely known.
The facts are that the Korans were seized at a jail because jihadists imprisoned there were using them not for prayer but to communicate incendiary messages. The soldiers dispatched to burn refuse from the jail were not the officials who had seized the books, had no idea they were burning Korans, and tried desperately to retrieve the books when the situation was brought to their attention.
Read the rest of the post at 

Andrew C. McCarthy column homepage at NRO: http://www.nationalreview.com/author/52265
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Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Newt Gingrich plays hardball, tells truth, electrifies South Carolina GOP debate re education policy, govt. benefits, war on terrorism, Pakistan; the post-debate spin on Sean Hannity Show


Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt on Education: Return Power to Parents. January 17, 2012. http://youtu.be/6Gc-x-tZ2bQ



Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt: "99 Weeks is an Associate Degree". January 17, 2012. http://youtu.be/2Xr72U1jdtE



Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt Gingrich to Juan Williams: Americans Want Paychecks, Not Government Food Stamps. January 17, 2012. 
http://youtu.be/4c1-22w2G7M



Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt Plan for America's Enemies: Kill Them. January 17, 2011. http://youtu.be/50WYM-1SjQQ



Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt Gingrich's appearance on Fox News Channel's Sean Hannity Show after the debate. January 17, 2012.
http://youtu.be/NTDP5-7OTj4


All videos are from the January 16, 2012 Republican Presidential debate held at North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina sponsored by Fox News Channel, The Wall Street Journal and the South Carolina Republican Party.





National Journal: Newt Gingrich on Mitt Romney: Why Nominate a Loser?, January 16, 2012. http://bcove.me/afa4zld8


National Journal
CAMPAIGN 2012
Gingrich on Romney: Why Nominate a Loser?
Former speaker says past defeats show Romney, Santorum are unelectable
By Sarah Huisenga
Updated: January 17, 2012 | 1:03 p.m.
January 16, 2012 | 5:32 p.m.
http://www.nationaljournal.com/2012-presidential-campaign/gingrich-on-romney-why-nominate-a-loser--20120116


The Florida GOP Presidential primary is two weeks from today and I will be voting for Newt Gingrich.
I received my new voter's registration card in the mail on Saturday, exactly eleven days after visiting the Broward Supervisor of Elections HQ in Ft. Lauderdale to do the paperwork to change my party registration. 


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More information on Newt Gingrich at:

http://www.newt.org/


http://www.youtube.com/user/ngingrich


http://twitter.com/newtgingrich 
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Wednesday, May 25, 2011

ProPublica: Witness: Pakistani Intel Officer Ordered Hit on Mumbai Jews

Watch the full episode. See more FRONTLINE.

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http://www.propublica.org/article/headley-testifies-about-meeting-with-pakistani-officers
ProPublica

Witness: Pakistani Intel Officer Ordered Hit on Mumbai Jews

by Sebastian Rotella ProPublica, May 24, 2011, 10:35 p.m.

This report is part of a ProPublica and PBS FRONTLINE [1] investigation. A version of this article appeared in the Washington Post [2].

An officer in Pakistan2019s intelligence service chose a Jewish center as a target for the 2008 Mumbai attacks and then helped launch a new plot against Denmark, according to the star witness in a terror trial in Chicago.

In his second day of testimony, David Coleman Headley, a confessed Pakistani-American terrorist, revealed more details about close ties between Pakistan2019s Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) and the Lashkar-i-Taiba terror group, which allegedly carried out the attacks that killed 166 people [3], including six Americans.

Headley said his ISI handler, a man known only as Major Iqbal, made key decisions and was a mastermind of the plot along with Lashkar chiefs. Major Iqbal deployed him on the last of five reconnaissance missions in India to scout targets that Iqbal said would definitely include the Chabad House, a Jewish community center where gunmen later killed three American rabbis, Headley testified. The pregnant wife of one of the rabbis was also killed.

201CMajor Iqbal told me the Chabad House would be added on whatever list [of targets] there was because it was a front office for the Mossad,201D Israel2019s intelligence agency, Headley said. He added that Major Iqbal 201Cseemed upset the [Mumbai] airport was not included201D as a target.

Nothing suggests that the claim about the Mossad was true.

Headley described in understated tones how terrorist leaders congratulated him for his work casing luxury hotels and other targets chosen to ensure Americans and Jews would die. Asked his reaction to the three-day televised slaughter [4], he responded: 201CI was pleased.201D

The 50-year-old businessman has pleaded guilty to conducting months of crucial reconnaissance in Mumbai and for the Denmark plot. He is the star witness in the trial of his accused accomplice, Tahawwur Rana, in Chicago federal court. U.S. prosecutors have also indicted Major Iqbal and three Lashkar chiefs, all but one of whom remain fugitives.

Pakistani officials deny any links to terrorism. They say Headley's allegations are not credible because of his past as a drug dealer and DEA informant.

But the slaying of Osama bin Laden in a Pakistani military town has worsened longtime suspicions of Pakistan and the stakes are high in a case built largely on a witness with an admitted pattern of duplicity. The damage to the U.S.-Pakistani relationship could be profound if the trial produces powerful evidence that Pakistani officers took part in a plot to kill Americans.

201CA lot of explanatory power has been put in the hands of David Headley, an undoubtedly flawed individual,201D said Stephen Tankel, author of a forthcoming book Storming the World Stage: the Story of Lashkar-e-Taiba. 201CThe US government clearly has confidence in Headley's testimony and has been able to support it with strong evidence related to his communications with men he asserts were ISI officers. ... It will be interesting to see if the prosecution introduces further evidence independent of Headley that these men were in the ISI, as that would seal an already strong case for official involvement at some level.201D

On Tuesday prosecutors presented details about the apparent involvement of serving intelligence officers. Headley testified that Major Iqbal and Lashkar used him as a shared operative as he tried to infiltrate Shiv Sena, a right-wing Hindu political party in India.

An email from Major Iqbal to Headley showed the officer trying to balance the twin missions of collecting military intelligence and developing terrorist targets. Asked by Headley if he should try to cultivate a Shiv Sena public relations official he had befriended, Iqbal responded that he was not sure if the potential Indian source would be productive for espionage but said he might still be worth pursuing for Lashkar, which he called 201Cyour organization.201D

201CWhat all advantages can we get from this person except strengthening our cover,201D Iqbal wrote. 201CWill this all be generating worthwhile information related to military or forces. ... If he is of any use to your organization, you are at liberty to handle even without my information or as you desire.201D

The testimony Tuesday also indicated that Iqbal was at least aware of a terrorist plot to strike the heart of Europe. Headley described a meeting in late 2008 in which Iqbal and Sajid Mir, his Lashkar handler, came together to his house in Lahore for the first time. Until then, the two had coordinated the American2019s missions in tandem but separately.

During the sit-down, Mir told Headley he would be sent to Denmark to scout for an attack on the Jyllands-Posten newspaper, which had enraged Muslims by printing cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.

201CWe were all angry about it,201D Headley testified. 201CMajor Iqbal said he was surprised such an attack had not taken place already.201D

Headley went to Denmark in January 2009, posing as an immigration consultant in visits to newspaper advertising representatives in Copenhagen and Aarhus. Two months later, however, Lashkar put the Denmark plot on hold. Major Iqbal cut off contact with Headley, instructing him to lay low because Pakistani authorities had put heat on Lashkar after the Mumbai attacks.

Soon, another ISI officer named Major Sameer Ali contacted Headley to try to recruit him for new operations and remained in touch with him until at least August, according to Headley2019s testimony and emails between the two presented in court. The mention of Major Ali in the trial brings the number of ISI officers Headley has described meeting to at least six, according to testimony and a report on Headley2019s interrogation by Indian investigators.

Headley met with Ali and a Colonel Shah in the ISI that April in Lahore, according to investigators, though that information was not presented in court Tuesday.

By then, however, Headley had shifted allegiance to al-Qaida and away from the ISI, urged on by a friend and former Pakistani military officer known as Pasha, who had left Lashkar for al-Qaida.

201CHe said they were conducting the ISI2019s jihad and we should conduct God2019s jihad,201D Headley said.

When Pasha was arrested by the ISI a few months later, Headley wrote to Major Ali inquiring about his friend2019s fate, according to testimony. Headley said Pasha had once worked with a colonel in the ISI, which he referred to in an email as 201Cyour department.201D Major Ali responded on August 4, 2009, to inform him of the release of the al-Qaida operative, who remains a fugitive indicted in the Chicago case.

201CYour friend that u asked about has reached home,201D Major Ali reassured Headley.

Even if the trial paints a convincing portrait of ties between ISI officers and terrorists, the analysis must be careful and measured, experts say.

201CTo date there is no evidence the ISI leadership was aware of the Mumbai attacks, or at least of their scope and scale, which suggests Major Iqbal and possibly others were acting without sanction,201D Tankel said. 201CWhether they were given excessive autonomy or were engaging in outright rogue behavior is a very important question and it will be interesting to see if the trial provides an answer.201D

See more FRONTLINE. [5]

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For previous entries on ProPublica's series Pakistan's Terror Connection, see: http://www.propublica.org/topic/mumbai-terror-attacks

In South Florida, FRONTLINE will be repeated at 1 a.m. Saturday morning on WPBT-TV, Channel 2.

See also: Key Mumbai Planner David Headley Tells Jury he Was 'Pleased' With 2008 Attacks http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/mumbai-terror-attack-trial-chicago-man-david-headley/story?id=13676959

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Bin Laden ønskede angreb mod Danmark

Af THOMAS ANDREW, Los Angeles-korrespondent

Offentliggjort 25.05.11 kl. 23:38 - opdateret 26.05.11kl.00:21

http://jp.dk/udland/usa/article2443300.ece

http://jp.dk/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jyllands-Posten_Muhammad_cartoons_controversy


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Monday, August 16, 2010

Just wondering: If private security firms are dis-banded in Afghanistan, who will protect the news media that's not embedded?

Just wondering: If private security firms are dis-banded in Afghanistan, who will protect the news media that's not embedded?

The Washington Post
Karzai moves to disband private security firms in Afghanistan
By Joshua Partlow
Monday, August 16, 2010; 9:58 AM

KABUL -- President Hamid Karzai intends to disband all private security companies in Afghanistan within four months, his spokesman said Monday, a timeline that likely will meet with strong resistance from NATO forces who rely heavily on the companies to provide security to convoys and installations across the country.

The announcement came as a surprise to U.S. military officials who have recently begun a review of their security contracts in an attempt to address the widespread allegations that such guards are unaccountable and that their reckless behavior inflames public sentiment against foreign forces

Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/16/AR2010081602041.html

For more on the nexus of American diplomacy, the military and the intelligence agencies, see the Washington Post's Checkpoint Washington blog at
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/checkpoint-washington/

Their latest post is: Gates retiring? Don't bet on it.
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